Madam Nong seemed not to notice the motor scooter until it was silent. She looked up to see Porn and Siri looking down at her.

“You’ll want a drink,” she said.

Her face was ashen but dry. Her skull seemed to have grabbed at her face and pulled it tight.

“Where is he?” Siri asked.

“In bed,” she said. “I’ll get him for you.”

It was a line so common to her lips she didn’t even realize she’d said it.

Dr. Porn sat on the other side of her and put an arm around her shoulder. Siri stepped over them and took off his leather sandals before going into the house. He walked through to the bedroom. Civilai’s body in Muay Thai boxing shorts and an Apocalypse Now T-shirt lay comfortably on the mattress. There was no question that he had a smile on his face. There was a chair beside the bed.

“Anyone sitting there?” Siri asked.

There was no objection so he sat beside his friend. In the films you only had to pass your palm across the eyes to close the lids. In reality you had to poke and prod and wrestle the bastards shut. So, even though it was a little bit creepy, Siri left the eyes open. They were as yellow as mustard. There was nothing to say. On the bed was a body that had once belonged to a great man. It was empty of soul and mind now, so there was no point in engaging it in conversation. There’d be time for that later.

Siri looked around the tidy bedroom. A glass cabinet with crockery and an unused tennis racket. Framed photographs on the dresser: Civilai and Nong in their sixties and their forties and back and beyond. The colors fading into memory until there were only pastel ghosts in ghostly locations. One photo of Siri and Civilai each shaking a hand of the last governor general of Indochina, a bogus smile of gratitude on his bloated face. One photo of the two couples: Siri and Boua, Civilai and Nong, black and white, a professional picture from a man who made a living from his art—the Eiffel Tower looming over them, the date, 1931. And Siri realized his hands were wet and noticed the steady drip from his cheeks but could not stop it and did not want to. He heaved the tears up all the way from his chest like an old pump emptying a flooded basement. He groaned out each spurt. Nobody came to investigate.

And when he was dry and silent he continued his study of the tidy room. And his eyes rested upon the bedside cabinet and a single pill box and the handwritten label attached to it:

Dr. Porn Chaisak Clinic. December 1st, 1980.

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Thirteen

Begone the Boulangere